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  • FBI: Polygamous leader had 20 wives, many of them minors

    FBI: Polygamous leader had 20 wives, many of them minors

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    FLAGSTAFF, Ariz. — The leader of small polygamous group near the Arizona-Utah border had taken at least 20 wives, most of them minors, and punished followers who did not treat him as a prophet, newly filed federal court documents show.

    Samuel Bateman was a former member of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, or FLDS, until he left to start his own small offshoot group. He was supported financially by male followers who also gave up their own wives and children to be Bateman’s wives, according to an FBI affidavit.

    The document filed Friday provides new insight about what investigators have found in a case that first became public in August. It accompanied charges of kidnapping and impeding a foreseeable prosecution against three of Bateman’s wives — Naomi Bistline, Donnae Barlow and Moretta Rose Johnson.

    Bistline and Barlow are scheduled to appear in federal magistrate court in Flagstaff on Wednesday. Johnson is awaiting extradition from Washington state.

    The women are accused of fleeing with eight of Bateman’s children, who were placed in Arizona state custody earlier this year. The children were found last week hundreds of miles (kilometers) away in Spokane, Washington.

    Bateman was arrested in August when someone spotted small fingers in the gap of a trailer he was hauling through Flagstaff. He posted bond but was arrested again and charged with obstructing justice in a federal investigation into whether children were being transported across state lines for sexual activity.

    Court records allege that Bateman, 46, engaged in child sex trafficking and polygamy, but none of his current charges relate to those allegations. Polygamy is illegal in Arizona but was decriminalized in Utah in 2020.

    Arizona Department of Child Services spokesman Darren DaRonco and FBI spokesman Kevin Smith declined to comment on the case Tuesday. Bistline’s attorney didn’t respond to a request for comment, and Barlow’s attorney declined to comment. Johnson didn’t have a publicly listed attorney.

    The FBI affidavit filed in the women’s case largely centers on Bateman, who proclaimed himself a prophet in 2019. Bateman says he was told by former FLDS leader Warren Jeffs to invoke the “Spirit of God on these people.” The affidavit details explicit sexual acts that Bateman and his followers engaged in to fulfill “Godly duties.”

    Jeffs is serving a life sentence in a Texas prison for child sex abuse related to underage marriages.

    Criminal defense attorney Michael Piccarreta, who represented Jeffs on Arizona charges that were dismissed, said the state has a history of trying to take a stand against polygamy by charging relatively minor offenses to build bigger cases.

    “Whether this is the same tactic that has been used in the past or whether there’s more to the story, only time will tell,” he said.

    The office of Bateman’s attorney in the federal case, Adam Zickerman, declined to comment Tuesday.

    Bateman lived in Colorado City among a patchwork of devout members of the polygamous FLDS, ex-church members and those who don’t practice the beliefs. Polygamy is a legacy of the early teachings of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, but the mainstream church abandoned the practice in 1890 and now strictly prohibits it.

    Bateman often traveled to Nebraska where some of his other followers lived and internationally to Canada and Mexico for conferences.

    When Bateman was arrested earlier this year, he instructed his followers to obtain passports and to delete messages sent through an encrypted system, authorities said.

    He demanded that his followers confess publicly for any indiscretions, and shared those confessions widely, according to the FBI affidavit. He claimed the punishments, which ranged from a time out to public shaming and sexual activity, came from the Lord, the affidavit states.

    The children identified by their initials in court documents have said little to authorities. The three children found in the trailer Bateman was hauling through Flagstaff — which had a makeshift toilet, a couch, camping chairs and no ventilation — told authorities they didn’t have any health or medical needs, a police report stated.

    None of the girls placed in state custody in Arizona disclosed sexual abuse by Bateman during forensic interviews, though one said she was present during sexual activity, according to the FBI affidavit. But the girls often wrote in journals that were seized by the FBI. In them, several of the girls referenced intimate interactions with Bateman. Authorities believe the older girls influenced the younger ones not to talk about Bateman, the FBI said.

    ———

    Associated Press writer Sam Metz in Salt Lake City contributed to this story.

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  • Supreme Court taking up clash of religion and gay rights

    Supreme Court taking up clash of religion and gay rights

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    WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court is hearing the case Monday of a Christian graphic artist who objects to designing wedding websites for gay couples, a dispute that’s the latest clash of religion and gay rights to land at the highest court.

    The designer and her supporters say that ruling against her would force artists — from painters and photographers to writers and musicians — to do work that is against their faith. Her opponents, meanwhile, say that if she wins, a range of businesses will be able to discriminate, refusing to serve Black customers, Jewish or Muslim people, interracial or interfaith couples or immigrants, among others.

    The case comes at a time when the court is dominated 6-3 by conservatives and following a series of cases in which the justices have sided with religious plaintiffs. It also comes as, across the street from the court, lawmakers in Congress are finalizing a landmark bill protecting same-sex marriage.

    The bill, which also protects interracial marriage, steadily gained momentum following the high court’s decision earlier this year to end constitutional protections for abortion. That decision to overturn the 1973 Roe v. Wade case prompted questions about whether the court — now that it is more conservative — might also overturn its 2015 decision declaring a nationwide right to same-sex marriage. Justice Clarence Thomas explicitly said that decision should also be reconsidered.

    The case being argued before the high court Monday involves Lorie Smith, a graphic artist and website designer in Colorado who wants to begin offering wedding websites. Smith says her Christian faith prevents her from creating websites celebrating same-sex marriages. But that could get her in trouble with state law. Colorado, like most other states, has what’s called a public accommodation law that says if Smith offers wedding websites to the public, she must provide them to all customers. Businesses that violate the law can be fined, among other things.

    Five years ago, the Supreme Court heard a different challenge involving Colorado’s law and a baker, Jack Phillips, who objected to designing a wedding cake for a gay couple. That case ended with a limited decision, however, and set up a return of the issue to the high court. Phillips’ lawyer, Kristen Waggoner of the Alliance Defending Freedom, is now representing Smith.

    Like Phillips, Smith says her objection is not to working with gay people. She says she’d work with a gay client who needed help with graphics for an animal rescue shelter, for example, or to promote an organization serving children with disabilities. But she objects to creating messages supporting same-sex marriage, she says, just as she won’t take jobs that would require her to create content promoting atheism or gambling or supporting abortion.

    Smith says Colorado’s law violates her free speech rights. Her opponents, including the Biden administration and groups such as the American Civil Liberties Union, the NAACP Legal Defense & Educational Fund, disagree.

    Twenty mostly liberal states, including California and New York, are supporting Colorado while another 20 mostly Republican states, including Arizona, Indiana, Ohio and Tennessee, are supporting Smith.

    The case is 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis, 21-476.

    ———

    Follow the AP’s coverage of the U.S. Supreme Court at https://apnews.com/hub/us-supreme-court.

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  • LGBTQ students wrestle with tensions at Christian colleges

    LGBTQ students wrestle with tensions at Christian colleges

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    COLLEGEVILLE, Minn. — As monks chanted prayers in Saint John’s University church, members of the student LGBTQ organization, QPLUS, were meeting in their lounge at the Minnesota institution’s sister Benedictine college, a few miles away.

    To Sean Fisher, a senior who identifies as non-binary and helps lead QPLUS, its official recognition and funding by Saint John’s and the College of Saint Benedict is welcome proof of the schools’ “acknowledging queer students exist.”

    But tensions endure here and at many of the hundreds of U.S. Catholic and Protestant universities. The Christian teachings they ascribe to differ from societal values over gender identity and sexual orientation, because they assert that God created humans in unchangeable male and female identities, and sex should only happen within the marriage of a man and a woman.

    “The ambivalence toward genuine care is clouded by Jesus-y attitudes. Like ‘Love your neighbor’ has an asterisk,” Fisher said.

    Most of the 200 Catholic institutions serving nearly 900,000 students have made efforts to be welcoming, said the Rev. Dennis Holtschneider, president of the Association of Catholic Colleges and Universities.

    Among Protestant institutions, a few push the envelope, and most hope to avoid controversy, according to John Hawthorne, a retired Christian college sociology professor and administrator.

    “Denominations won’t budge, so colleges will need to lead the way,” Hawthorne said, adding there might not be enough students in the future interested in conservative colleges. “Today’s college freshman was born in 2004, the year Massachusetts legalized same-sex marriage.”

    Most Christian schools list “sexual orientation” in their nondiscrimination statements, and half also include “gender identity” – far more than did so in 2013, said Jonathan Coley, a Oklahoma State University sociologist who maintains a database of LGBTQ student policies at Christian colleges.

    But translating nondiscrimination into practice creates tensions and backlash. At some conservative schools, discrimination complaints have been filed, while some parents and clergy argue more affirming institutions are betraying their mission.

    “We have to learn to live with this tension,” said the Rev. Donal Godfrey, chaplain at the University of San Francisco, a Jesuit institution in a city with a history of LGBTQ activism and a conservative Catholic archbishop opposed to same-sex marriage.

    “Catholic colleges and universities …. are the most LGBTQ-friendly places in the church in the United States,” said Francis DeBernando. New Ways Ministry, the advocacy organization for LGBTQ Catholics he leads, keeps a list of Catholic colleges it considers LGBTQ-friendly.

    The Cardinal Newman Society, which advocates for fidelity to church teachings on Catholic education issues, maintains its own list of recommended schools.

    “For these colleges, being ‘Catholic’ is not a watered-down brand or historical tradition,” Newman president Patrick Reilly said via email.

    Other campus leaders see tension in Catholic teachings tending to skew conservative on human sexuality but progressive on social justice.

    “It’s kind of a tightrope,” said John Scarano, campus ministry director at John Carroll University, a Jesuit school near Cleveland.

    To parents and prospective students undecided between John Carroll and Franciscan University in Steubenville, Ohio, Scarano says, “Here, your Catholicism is going to be challenged.”

    At Franciscan, “we don’t move away from the truth of the human person as discovered in Scripture, the tradition of the Church, and the teaching authority of the Church,” said the Rev. Jonathan St. Andre, a senior university leader, adding Franciscan doesn’t tolerate harassment of those who disagree.

    Students’ safety is a priority, said Mary Geller, the associate provost at Saint John’s and Saint Benedict. The single-sex institutions in Minnesota now admit students based on the gender they identify with, and consider transfers for those who transition.

    That enrages a few parents, like a father complaining “that we have students with male body parts in a female dorm,” Geller recalled. “I just said, ‘Sir, I don’t check body parts.’”

    Last year, LGBTQ students or former students at federally funded Christian schools filed a class-action lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Education, claiming its religious exemption allows schools to unconstitutionally discriminate against LGBTQ students.

    In May, the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights launched a separate investigation for alleged violations of LGBTQ students’ rights at six Christian universities — including Liberty University.

    The independent evangelical university has greatly expanded its prohibitive rules, forbidding LGBTQ clubs, same-sex displays of affection, and use of pronouns, restrooms and changing facilities not corresponding to a person’s birth sex. Liberty’s student handbook bans statements and behaviors associated with what it calls “LGBT states of mind.”

    “Liberty is very anti-gay,” said Sydney Windsor, a senior there who came to Liberty to quash her attraction for women and now identifies as pansexual. “It’s years of irreversible trauma.”

    At some evangelical schools, the fight for rights has moved to LGBTQ diversity in faculty and staff hiring.

    This year, Eastern University, located in St. Davids, Pennsylvania, and affiliated with American Baptist Churches USA, amended its policies to allow for hiring faculty in same-sex marriages — one of only a handful of evangelical schools to do so.

    “If we can get faculty to come out and to have queer people openly represented on campus, that would be really big,” said Faith Jeanette Millender, a student there who identifies as bisexual or queer.

    A clash between students, faculty and the school’s board of trustees over hiring LGBTQ faculty is unfolding at Seattle Pacific University, a Free Methodist Church-affiliated school.

    The faculty held a vote of no-confidence in the board over its keeping the policy barring people in same-sex relationships from full-time positions. Faculty and students have also sued the board for breaching its fiduciary duty.

    “I know how much Christianity has brought harm to communities, whether its people of color, women, or LGBTQ people,” said Chloe Guillot, 22, an SPU graduate student and one of 16 plaintiffs in that lawsuit. “I have a responsibility to step into those spaces and be willing to fight back. As someone who is a Christian, we need to hold ourselves accountable.”

    The administration responded to one of the suits in a court filing saying it expects students and faculty to “affirm the University’s statement of faith, and to abide by its lifestyle expectations, which together shape the vision and mission of the institution.”

    To students, concrete actions will show if LGBTQ people can truly be welcomed on Christian campuses.

    Ryan Imm, a Saint John’s junior and QPLUS leader who identifies as gay, recalled an anti-LGBTQ slur used on his residential floor. But he also pointed to hopeful signs — like Saint Benedict’s popular drag show.

    “It’s almost like people forget there’s dissonance,” Imm said.

    ———

    Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.

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  • Ukraine bans religious organizations with links to Russia

    Ukraine bans religious organizations with links to Russia

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    KYIV, Ukraine — Ukraine on Friday banned the activities of religious organizations “affiliated with centers of influence” in Russia and said it would examine the links between the Ukrainian and Russian Orthodox churches.

    Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy signed a decree enacting a National Security and Defense Council decision to impose personal sanctions against representatives of religious organizations associated with Russia, which invaded Ukraine more than nine months ago.

    Zelenskyy’s decree additionally provided for examining the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate, one of two Orthodox bodies in Ukraine following a schism that in 2019 resulted in the establishment of one with independence from the Russian church.

    Ukrainian officials suspect the Ukrainian Orthodox Church is promoting pro-Russian views and that some priests may be actively collaborating with Russia. Moscow Patriarch Kirill, the head of the Russian Orthodox Church, has justified Russia’s war in Ukraine as part of a “metaphysical struggle” to prevent a liberal ideological encroachment from the West.

    Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov accused Ukrainian authorities last week of “waging a war on the Russian Orthodox Church.” But the Rev. Mykolay Danylevich, who has often served as a spokesperson for the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, disputed Peskov’s characterization, asserting on Telegram that the church was not Russian.

    The UOC declared its independence from Moscow in May over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

    In his nightly video address on Thursday, Zelenskyy said the use of Kyiv’s Pechersk Lavra monastery complex — a UNESCO world heritage site revered as the cradle of Orthodox monasticism in the region — would also come under further scrutiny.

    Members of the Security Service of Ukraine, the country’s National Guard and police searched the monastery last week after a priest spoke favorably about Russia during a service there. The Security Service said its agents searched more than 350 church buildings in all, including at another monastery and in a diocese of the Rivne region, 240 kilometers (150 miles) west of Kyiv.

    The security agency, which is known by the Ukrainian acronym SBU, said the searches turned up “pro-Russian literature, which is used during studies in seminaries and parish schools, including for propaganda of the ‘Russian world.’” More than 50 people underwent in-depth “counterintelligence interviews, including using a polygraph,” as part of the investigation, the agency said.

    The investigation of the centuries-old monastic complex in Ukraine’s capital and other religious sites underscored Ukrainian authorities’ suspicions about some Orthodox Christian clergy they consider as remaining loyal to Russia. The SBU said last week’s activities were part of its “systematic work to counter the subversive activities of the Russian special services in Ukraine.”

    Orthodox Christians are the largest religious population in Ukraine. But they have been fractured along lines that echo political tensions over Ukraine’s defense of its independence and its Western orientation amid Russia’s continued claim to political and spiritual hegemony in the region — a concept sometimes called the “Russian world.” Many Orthodox leaders have spoken fiercely in favor of Ukrainian independence and denounced the Russian invasion, but the recent searches show that authorities suspect places like Pechersk Lavra of being hotbeds of pro-Russian sentiment and activity.

    ———

    Follow AP’s coverage of the war in Ukraine: https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine

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  • China vows more ‘friendly consensus’ amid Vatican complaints

    China vows more ‘friendly consensus’ amid Vatican complaints

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    BEIJING — Beijing and the Vatican are once again tangling over the prickly issue of appointing Chinese bishops.

    After complaints from the Vatican that Beijing was violating a 2018 interim accord, China’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian on Monday said the country is willing to expand the “friendly consensus” achieved with the Vatican over bishop nominations.

    The Vatican issued an unusually harsh statement Saturday complaining that Beijing on Nov. 24 had installed Bishop John Peng Weizhao as an auxiliary bishop in the province of Jiangxi, which the Vatican doesn’t recognize as a diocese.

    China and the Vatican haven’t had diplomatic relations since 1951, following the Communists’ rise to power and the expulsion of foreign priests. The Vatican has sought in recent years to open contacts and reduce frictions, particularly over the appointment of bishops.

    At a daily briefing Monday, Zhao said he was unaware of the specific situation involving Bishop Peng, but said that relations between China and the Vatican had improved over recent years for the benefit and “harmonious development” of Chinese Catholicism.

    “China is willing to continuously expand the friendly consensus with the Vatican side and jointly maintain the spirit of our interim agreement,” he told reporters.

    In its statement, the Vatican said Peng’s installation ceremony took place after “long and heavy pressure from the local authorities.”

    “In fact, this event did not take place in accordance with the spirit of dialogue,” or what is called for by the 2018 accord, the Vatican statement said.

    Since the break in ties, Catholics in China since have been divided between those who belong to an official, state-sanctioned church and an underground church loyal to the pontiff. Estimates of the total number of Chinese Catholics run between 6 million and 12 million worshiping in both the recognized Patriotic Catholic Association and the underground church.

    The Vatican efforts toward reconciliation led to its willingness to sign what it admits is a far-from-ideal accord in 2018, which regularized the status of several bishops and paved the way for future nominations. Full details of the agreement never have been made public but Pope Francis has claimed he has final say in the process.

    The agreement was seen as a step toward warmer ties that would help fill dozens of empty seats, but it was hotly criticized by many, including by Hong Kong’s influential bishop emeritus Cardinal Joseph Zen.

    AsiaNews, which follows the Catholic Church closely in China, said Francis had ordained Peng clandestinely as bishop of Yujiang in 2014, four years before the 2018 accord, explaining the Holy See’s lament that he had been named by Beijing to another diocese that it doesn’t recognize.

    It was the first time the Vatican had explicitly accused Beijing of violating the 2018 accord and came just a month after the agreement was renewed for another two years.

    The Holy See said it hoped that “similar episodes will not be repeated.”

    Under nationalist leader Xi Jinping, the officially atheist Communist Party has pressured all religions to “sinosize,” meaning they must closely adhere to its rulings on all matters and reject foreign involvement.

    Strict anti-COVID-19 social distancing and quarantine rules have also seen religious services disrupted for the better part of four years since the virus was first detected in the central Chinese city of Wuhan in late 2019.

    ———

    Associated Press writer Nicole Winfield in Rome contributed to this report.

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  • Hong Kong finds 90-year-old cardinal guilty over pro-democracy protest fund | CNN

    Hong Kong finds 90-year-old cardinal guilty over pro-democracy protest fund | CNN

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    Hong Kong
    CNN
     — 

    A 90-year-old former bishop and outspoken critic of China’s ruling Communist Party was found guilty Friday on a charge relating to his role in a relief fund for Hong Kong’s pro-democracy protests in 2019.

    Cardinal Joseph Zen and five others, including the Cantopop singer Denise Ho, contravened the Societies Ordinance by failing to register the now-defunct “612 Humanitarian Relief Fund” that was partly used to pay protesters’ legal and medical fees, the West Kowloon Magistrates’ Courts ruled.

    The silver-haired cardinal, who appeared in court with a walking stick, and his co-defendants had all denied the charge.

    The case is considered a marker of political freedom in Hong Kong during an ongoing crackdown on the pro-democracy movement, and comes at a sensitive time for the Vatican, which is preparing to renew a controversial deal with Beijing over the appointment of bishops in China.

    Outside the court, Zen told reporters that he hoped people wouldn’t link his conviction to religious freedom.

    “I saw many people overseas are concerned about a cardinal being arrested. It is not related to religious freedom. I am part of the fund. (Hong Kong) has not seen damage (to) its religious freedom,” Zen said.

    Zen and four other trustees of the fund – singer Ho, barrister Margaret Ng, scholar Hui Po Keung, and politician Cyd Ho – were sentenced to fines of HK$4,000 ($510) each.

    A sixth defendant, Sze Ching-wee, who was the fund’s secretary, was fined HK$2,500 ($320).

    All had initially been charged under the controversial Beijing-backed national security law for colluding with foreign forces, which carries a maximum penalty of life imprisonment. Those charges were dropped and they instead faced a lesser charge under the Societies Ordinance, a century-old colonial-era law punishable with fines of up to HK$10,000 ($1,274) but not jail time for first-time offenders.

    The court heard in September that the legal fund raised the equivalent of $34.4 million through 100,000 deposits.

    In addition to providing financial aid to protesters, the fund was also used to sponsor pro-democracy rallies, such as paying for audio equipment used in 2019 during street protests to resist Beijing’s tightening grip.

    Although Zen and the other five defendants were spared from being charged under the national security law, the legislation imposed by Beijing over Hong Kong in June 2020 in a bid to quell the protests has repeatedly been used to curb dissent.

    Since the imposition of the law, most of the city’s prominent pro-democracy figures have either been arrested or gone into exile, while several independent media outlets and non-government organizations have been shuttered.

    The Hong Kong government has repeatedly denied criticism that the law – which criminalizes acts of secession, subversion, terrorism, and collusion with foreign forces – has stifled freedoms, claiming instead it has restored order in the city after the 2019 protest movement.

    Hong Kong’s prosecution of one of Asia’s most senior clergyman has cast the relationship between Beijing and the Holy See into sharp focus.

    Zen has strongly opposed a controversial agreement struck in 2018 between the Vatican and China over the appointment of bishops. Previously both sides had demanded the final say on bishop appointments in mainland China, where religious activities are heavily monitored and sometimes banned.

    Born to Catholic parents in Shanghai in 1932, Zen fled to Hong Kong with his family to escape looming Communist rule as a teenager. He was ordained as a priest in 1961 and made Bishop of Hong Kong in 2002, before retiring in 2009.

    Known as the “conscience of Hong Kong” among his supporters, Zen has long been a prominent advocate for democracy, human rights and religious freedom. He has been on the front lines of some of the city’s most important protests, from the mass rally against national security legislation in 2003 to the “Umbrella Movement” demanding universal suffrage in 2014.

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  • Hong Kong court convicts Cardinal Zen, 5 others over fund

    Hong Kong court convicts Cardinal Zen, 5 others over fund

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    HONG KONG — A 90-year-old Catholic cardinal and five others in Hong Kong were fined after being found guilty Friday of failing to register a now-defunct fund that aimed to help people arrested in the widespread protests three years ago.

    Cardinal Joseph Zen, a retired bishop and a vocal democracy advocate of the city, arrived at court in a black outfit and used a walking stick. He was first arrested in May on suspicion of colluding with foreign forces under a Beijing-imposed National Security Law. His arrest sent shockwaves through the Catholic community, although the Vatican only stated it was monitoring the development of the situation closely.

    While Zen and other activists at the trial have not yet been charged with national security-related charges, they were charged with failing to properly register the 612 Humanitarian Relief Fund, which helped pay medical and legal fees for arrested protesters beginning in 2019. It ceased operations in October 2021.

    Zen, alongside singer Denise Ho, scholar Hui Po Keung, former pro-democracy lawmakers Margaret Ng and Cyd Ho, were trustees of the fund. They were each fined 4,000 Hong Kong dollars ($512). A sixth defendant, Sze Ching-wee, was the fund’s secretary and was fined HK$2500 ($320).

    The Societies Ordinance requires local organizations to register or apply for an exemption within a month of their establishment. Those who failed to do so face a fine of up to HK$10,000 ($1,273), with no jail time, upon first conviction.

    Handing down the verdict, Principal Magistrate Ada Yim ruled that the fund is considered an organization that is obliged to register as it was not purely for charity purposes.

    The National Security Law has crippled Hong Kong’s pro-democracy movement since its enactment in 2020, with many activists being arrested or jailed in the semi-autonomous Chinese city. Hong Kong, a former British colony, returned to China’s rule in 1997.

    The impact of the law has also damaged faith in the future of the international financial hub, with a growing number of young professionals responding to the shrinking freedoms by emigrating overseas.

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  • Pope ousts leadership of Caritas Internationalis charity

    Pope ousts leadership of Caritas Internationalis charity

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    ROME — Pope Francis on Tuesday ousted the management of the Vatican’s international charitable organization Caritas Internationalis and appointed temporary leadership after an external review found management and morale problems at its head office.

    A Vatican statement said the review found no evidence of financial mismanagement or sexual impropriety. But it said other issues did emerge, with “real deficiencies” found in management, “seriously prejudicing team spirit and staff morale.”

    Ousted was the secretary general of Caritas Internationalis, Aloysius John, who was elected in a contested vote in 2019, as well as the leadership and governance team. The changes do not affect the leadership of any of the 162 national development and relief organizations that make up the Caritas global confederation.

    Caritas Internationalis is one of the Holy See’s main charity organizations and acts as the global umbrella for national and regional federations that operate in more than 200 countries. The Rome-based secretariat reported income of some 5.1 million euros ($5.2 million) in 2020 and expenditures of 4.4 million euros, according to the annual statement.

    John, an Indian native, had been brought into the Caritas Internationalis’ management structure as head of development in 2013 by its previous secretary general, Michele Roy, from the French Caritas federation, known as Secours Catholique. When Roy’s term ended, John ran for the position of secretary general and won after other initial candidates dropped out, and after initially failing to win a majority of votes.

    A former Caritas employee who cooperated with the external reviewers said he recounted instances of bullying and incompetence under John, especially in the handling of the fallout of a sex abuse scandal in the Caritas’ operations in Central African Republic. The former employee spoke on condition of anonymity, citing a fear of retaliation.

    In late 2019, in response to a CNN investigation, Roy admitted he had learned in 2017 of pedophilia concerns about the director of the Bangui Caritas operations, but left it to the priest’s immediate superiors to investigate. They did not, and CNN identified at least two child victims while the priest was in the country.

    John didn’t respond to an email seeking comment.

    Francis named as temporary administrator of Caritas Internationalis Pier Francesco Pinelli, an organizational consultant who had participated in the external review and will lead the organization until new elections for a secretary general are held in 2023. The current head of advocacy, Maria Amparo Alonso Escobar, stays on and Francis appointed a Jesuit priest to help with the “personal and spiritual accompaniment of the staff.”

    Caritas’ current president, Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle, who heads the Vatican’s evangelization department, will remain on to work under the new temporary administrators, the statement said.

    Pinelli had taken part in a 2021 evaluation of the Vatican’s development office, which resulted in a shakeup of the leadership team there and the appointment of Cardinal Michael Czerny, a top Francis ally, as prefect. Caritas Internationalis is part of the development office.

    In a statement Tuesday, the development office said the review of Caritas was undertaken to asses the secretariat office’s “alignment with Catholic values of human dignity and respect for each person.”

    Czerny said the changes should enable Caritas to meet the challenges of serving the “least and the suffering” but also to make sure that it does so making sure the organization “proves equal to its mission.”

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  • Parenting 101: Advent calendars that will have you feeling festive for December

    Parenting 101: Advent calendars that will have you feeling festive for December

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    What better way to countdown to the holidays than with an advent calendar. There are differently-themed calendars for everyone, young and old alike. Whether you go with something to nibble or something to spoil yourself, these are some of the year’s best advent calendars that will having you feeling festive for December.

    The 2022 Classic Holiday Advent Calendar from L’Occitane features 24 formulas for daily surprises in sustainably sourced and reusable packaging. Every day you’ll unlock travel-sized versions of classics, including nourishing shea-enriched formulas, signature Verbena and Rose hand creams, indulgent body lotions, gentle cleansing soaps, and a full-sized Almond Delicious Hands for a touch of warmth and softness all season long. 

    The PAW Patrol: 2022 Advent Calendar with 24 surprise toys, available at Toys R Us, has a new surprise waiting behind each door. Kids will discover their favorite pups Chase, Marshall, Skye, Rubble, Everest, Rocky and Zuma, dressed up for the holidays, two bears, a baby turtle, a kitten, a snail, a bunny and a deer, Chickaletta wearing her hat and scarf, two tents, a cabin, two Pine trees, a fire pit, a lantern and more. Once all 24 gifts have been opened, kids can use their imaginations to create an adventure bay snow day and send the pups and their friends on exciting holiday missions.

    The LEGO Star Wars’ Advent Calendar, also available at TRU, features eight LEGO Star Wars characters, including C-3PO and R2-D2 in holiday sweaters decorated with each other’s portraits, a Gonk Droid dressed as Santa and Darth Vader in a summer outfit from LEGO Star Wars Summer Vacation on Disney+. Build and play A super holiday gift idea for Star Wars fans aged 6 and up, the calendar contains 16 mini builds, such as an ARC-170 Starfighter, Bad Batch Shuttle, V-35 Landspeeder and a moisture vaporator. Kids will find assorted builds and accessories to play out Battle of Hoth stories, a Wampa cave in which the Luke Skywalker LEGO minifigure can be hung upside down and a beach scene for Darth Vader on vacation.

    The Body Shop’s Share the Love Big Advent Calendar not only has an amazing pop-up construction that transports you to a joyful Christmas world. but it’s packed with some seriously good head-to-toe treats for keeping you and that beautiful body pampered all season.

    The 24 Days of Matcha Advent Calendar from David’s Tea has 24 of your fave one-of-a-kind blends, must-sip classics, as well as festive best sellers. Made from finely ground full tea leaves, their selection is sourced directly from Japan to bring you the highest quality green. It’s matcha so good, it even makes the Grinch smile.

    – Jennifer Cox

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  • ‘Jeopardy!’ fans are frustrated by this controversial Bible clue | CNN

    ‘Jeopardy!’ fans are frustrated by this controversial Bible clue | CNN

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    “Jeopardy!” fans are confused and more than a little miffed after a controversial Final Jeopardy! clue divided contestants in the final rounds of the program’s “Tournament of Champions.” This is the second clue controversy the program has faced in just a few days.

    Amy Schneider, Andrew He and Sam Buttrey are the final champions standing in the tournament, and the first person to win three rounds will be the ultimate victor. In Wednesday’s episode, the trio was faced with this clue, under the category “New Testament”:

    “Paul’s letter to them is the New Testament epistle with the most Old Testament quotations.”

    The statement isn’t controversial because it’s about the Bible. That’s not an uncommon topic on the trivia show. But the correct answer is still a subject of debate, even among Biblical scholars.

    Schneider answered “Who are the Hebrews,” and was deemed correct by host Ken Jennings.

    Buttrey answered “Who are the Romans,” and was deemed incorrect.

    He said “Philippiaes,” likely in reference to the Philippians, which was also incorrect.

    All of the answers refer to books in the Bible that are collections of epistles, or letters, ostensibly from Jesus’ apostle Paul to different groups in the formative days of the Christian church. However, experts have varying opinions on whether Paul actually wrote the letter to the Hebrews – and thus, whether the answer was actually correct. In fact, there are bitter divisions among different schools of Christian thought regarding Paul’s Biblical influence and authorship.

    Many “Jeopardy!” viewers thought Buttrey’s answer should have been the correct one, since scholars generally agree Paul was the author of the book of Romans.

    Even experts on religion and history weighed in.

    “The challenge: Hebrews has the most OT quotes of any NT letter; it was historically attributed to Paul; but today most argue he didn’t write it based mainly on internal evidence,” a priest and theology professor wrote on Twitter. “(Romans is right if Paul didn’t write Hebrews),” he added.

    “Dear Jeopardy: But Paul didn’t write Hebrews!!!!!!!” wrote another historian and theologian.

    Others postulated that, regardless of the answer, the clue was not clearly worded in regards to letters, epistles and books of the Bible – all deeply confusing terms for people outside (and sometimes inside) the spheres of Biblical study.

    In the middle of the confusion, He emerged as the night’s winner despite his incorrect Final Jeopardy! answer, and is one win away from tournament victory.

    It’s worth noting that Buttrey, who had the answer some people think should have been correct, is a fan favorite and would have won if he secured the last answer.

    Just a few days before the Bible kerfuffle, an episode of “Celebrity Jeopardy!” featured a clue about the 2021 death of Instagram personality Gabby Petito and the suicide death of her boyfriend, Brian Laundrie, who wrote that he was responsible for her murder.

    “In 2021 fugitive Brian Laundrie ended his days in FLA’s Myakkahatchee Creek area, home to these long & toothy critters,” the clue read.

    (The answer was “What are alligators?”)

    Viewers were appalled that the question invoked both suicide and a highly publicized murder.

    “Y’all couldn’t have gotten to alligator AAAAAANY other way???” one viewer wrote.

    In a statement to various media organizations, an attorney for the Laundrie family demanded an apology from the show, calling the question “distasteful.”

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  • US Catholic bishops worry about abortion views in the pews

    US Catholic bishops worry about abortion views in the pews

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    BALTIMORE — Even as they signaled a continued hardline stance on opposing abortion and same-sex marriage, the nation’s Catholic bishops acknowledged Wednesday that they’re struggling to reach a key audience: their own flock.

    The members of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops rounded out their leadership bench during the last day of public sessions of their fall annual meeting in Baltimore, which concludes with private meetings Thursday.

    They also set in motion a plan to recirculate their long-standing election document in 2024 — a 15-year-old statement that prioritizes opposition to abortion — while acknowledging it’s outdated and adding a cover statement addressing such things as the teachings of Pope Francis and the Supreme Court’s Dobbs ruling in June that overturned the nationwide right to abortion.

    The bishops elected Oklahoma City Archbishop Paul Coakley as secretary in a 130-104 vote over Cardinal Joseph Tobin of Newark, New Jersey, who had been named a cardinal by Pope Francis. It’s the second time in five years that the bishops have passed over a Francis-appointed cardinal for a key leadership post.

    Earlier this year, Coakley had applauded the decision by San Francisco’s archbishop to deny Communion to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a Catholic Democrat from that city who supports abortion rights. So had the bishops’ new point man on opposition to abortion — Bishop Michael Burbidge of Arlington, Virginia, elected Wednesday as chairman of its Committee on Pro-Life Activities.

    The votes came a day after the bishops elected as their new president Archbishop Timothy Broglio of the Archdiocese for the Military Services. Broglio is also seen as more of a culture warrior than Pope Francis, though Broglio has dismissed the idea of any “dissonance” between the two.

    At the same time, Coakley cited the importance of Francis’ priorities in a news conference Wednesday.

    Coakley is leading the bishops’ review of, “Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship,” a document they have used in election years with only minor revisions since 2007.

    While a full revision will take years, bishops approved Coakley’s recommendation to begin drafting a new introduction to issue with the document in time for 2024’s election. It would incorporate recent events such as the Ukraine war and the Dobbs decision.

    The plan also includes using parish bulletins and social media to share main ideas from the lengthy document.

    Coakley said the new introduction needs to reflect Pope Francis’ priorities, such as promoting civil discourse and protecting the environment.

    “It’s a rich pontificate that offers us plenty to lay out for people … to embrace the vision that Pope Francis has articulated,” Coakley said.

    Bishops from both the progressive and conservative flanks of the church echoed concern that Catholics aren’t reading the document.

    Bishop John Stowe of Lexington, Kentucky, a Francis appointee, said that bishops need a statement that’s relevant amid the shaken confidence in democracy following the U.S. Capitol riot and in the wake of Dobbs and defeats for abortion opponents in votes on five state ballot measures. “It’s irresponsible to issue an old teaching and suggest the church has nothing new to say when so much of this context has changed,” he said.

    Bishop Joseph Strickland of Tyler, Texas, one of the most outspoken conservative bishops, lamented the recent state ballot measures. Polls show Catholics to be mixed on legal abortion.

    “I think it’s a solid document,” Strickland said, but “I think we have to acknowledge people aren’t listening.”

    The gap between Francis and the U.S. bishops reflects in part the conference’s continued emphasis on culture-war battles over abortion and same-sex marriage.

    Francis, while also opposing both in keeping with church teaching, has used his papacy to emphasize a wider agenda of bringing mercy to those at the margins, such as migrants and other poor. The Vatican said in 2021 the church cannot bless gay unions because God “cannot bless sin,” but Francis has made outreach to the church’s LGBTQ members a hallmark of his papacy. As recently as last Friday, Francis met with the Rev. James Martin, an American Jesuit priest whom the pontiff has supported in his calls for dialogue with LGBTQ Catholics.

    Both Pelosi and President Joe Biden, another Catholic who favors legalized abortion, have received Communion since 2021 in churches in Rome, the pope’s own diocese.

    The bishops also heard an impassioned talk Wednesday by Archbishop Borys Gudziak of the Ukrainian Archeparchy of Philadelphia on behalf of war-torn Ukraine.

    Gudziak thanked U.S. Catholics for providing millions in relief for displaced Ukrainians and urged continued American support for Ukraine’s self-defense, saying Russian assaults have left many vulnerable in the coming winter.

    At the same time, he said that on a conference call with staff at a Catholic university in Lviv, he heard only joy and resolve even amid losses of electrical power in Russia’s missile barrage Tuesday. One staff member told him, “Better without electricity and with Kherson,” he said, alluding to the recently liberated city.

    Gudziak accused Russia of a “genocide” through such attacks and through its denial of Ukrainians’ identity as a separate people.

    Also Wednesday, a small group of survivors of sexual abuse and their supporters held a sidewalk news conference outside Baltimore Marriott Waterfront, where the bishops are meeting. While this year marks the 20th anniversary of the bishops’ landmark policy barring all abusers from ministry, advocates are seeking more transparency.

    They called for bishops in every diocese to post detailed lists of credibly accused abusers and to stop lobbying against state legislation that would extend statutes of limitations for abuse lawsuits.

    David Lorenz, Maryland director of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, cited Archbishop Broglio’s archdiocese as one of the few that still does not publish even a minimal list of abusers. Broglio declined to comment.

    “I don’t need another apology because it doesn’t do anything to protect kids,” Lorenz added. “I want action to help kids. I want them (bishops) to be totally, absolutely transparent.”

    Also Wednesday, the bishops voted to advance efforts to have three American women declared saints.

    They include Michelle Duppong of North Dakota, a campus missionary who died of cancer in 2014 and is credited with showing faithfulness in suffering.

    They also include two 20th century women: Cora Evans, a Catholic convert from Utah who reported mystical experiences from an early age; and Mother Margaret Mary Healy Murphy of Texas, founder of a religious order, who provided education and other ministry to African Americans.

    ———

    Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.

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  • Louisiana churches leave Methodist denomination amid schism

    Louisiana churches leave Methodist denomination amid schism

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    NEW ORLEANS, La. — The United Methodist Church, a mainstay of the American religious landscape, has cut ties with 58 churches in its Louisiana conference amid a nationwide schism within the Protestant denomination.

    The disaffiliations, approved in a virtual conference session Saturday, were the latest in a series of decisions that many Louisiana churches have made in recent weeks to leave the national congregation. Internal tensions over sexuality and theology have roiled the church.

    The congregation’s delegates voted 487-35 in favor of the departures. The disaffiliations required support from two-thirds of the delegates.

    Six churches leaving the conference are from the New Orleans area. Another seven churches are from the Baton Rouge area. St. Timothy, which at 6,000 members is one of the largest Methodist congregations in Louisiana, voted to pursue disaffiliation on Nov. 1, The Advocate reported.

    The United Methodist Church is the latest of several mainline Protestant denominations in the U.S. to begin fracturing amid debates over sexuality and theology. The flashpoints are the denomination’s bans on same-sex marriages and ordaining openly LGBTQ clergy — though many see these as symptoms of deeper differences in views on justice, theology and scriptural authority.

    The denomination has repeatedly upheld these bans at legislative General Conferences, but some U.S. churches and clergy have defied them. This spring, the Church’s conservative wing launched a new Global Methodist Church, where they are determined to maintain and enforce such bans.

    A proposal to amicably divide the denomination and its assets, unveiled in early 2020, has lost its once-broad support after years of pandemic-related delays to the legislative General Conference, whose vote was needed to ratify it. Now the breakup and the negotiations are happening piecemeal — one regional conference at a time.

    In annual regional gatherings across the U.S. earlier this year, United Methodists approved requests of about 300 congregations to quit the denomination, according to United Methodist News Service. Special meetings in the second half of the year are expected to vote on as many as 1,000 more, according to the conservative advocacy group Wesleyan Covenant Association.

    Those departing are still a fraction of the estimated 30,000 congregations in the United States alone, with nearly 13,000 more abroad, according to recent UMC statistics.

    The Louisiana disaffiliations will take effect after Dec. 31, church officials said. The Louisiana conference will also see a new bishop in the new year, Delores Williamston. She is the conference’s first Black female bishop.

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  • LGBTQ-friendly votes signal progressive shift for Methodists

    LGBTQ-friendly votes signal progressive shift for Methodists

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    The United Methodist Church moved toward becoming more progressive and LGBTQ-affirming during U.S. regional meetings this month that included the election of its second openly gay bishop. Conservatives say the developments will only accelerate their exit from one of the nation’s largest Protestant denominations.

    Each of the UMC’s five U.S. jurisdictions — meeting separately in early November — approved similarly worded measures aspiring to a future of church where “LGBTQIA+ people will be protected, affirmed, and empowered.”

    They also passed non-binding measures asking anyone to withdraw from leadership roles if they’re planning to leave the denomination soon — a category that almost entirely includes conservatives moving toward the exits.

    The denomination still officially bans same-sex marriage and the ordination of any “self-avowed, practicing homosexual,” and only a legislative gathering called the General Conference can change that.

    But this month’s votes show growing momentum — at least in the American half of the global church — to defy these policies and seek to reverse them at the next legislative gathering in 2024.

    Supporters and opponents of these measures drew from the same metaphor to say their church is either becoming more or less of a “big tent,” as the United Methodists have long been described as a theologically diverse, mainstream denomination.

    “It demonstrates that the big tent has collapsed,” said the Rev. Jay Therrell, president of the conservative Wesleyan Covenant Association, which has been helping churches that want to leave the denomination.

    “For years, bishops have told traditionalists that there is room for everyone in the United Methodist Church,” he said. “Not one single traditionalist bishop was elected. Moreover, we now have the most progressive or liberal council of bishops in the history of Methodism, period.”

    But Jan Lawrence, executive director of Reconciling Ministries Network, which works toward inclusion of Methodists of all sexual orientations and gender identities, applauded the regional jurisdictions. She cited their LGBTQ-affirming votes and their expansion of the racial, ethnic and gender diversity of bishops.

    Jurisdictions elected the church’s first Native American and Filipino American bishops, with other landmark votes within specific regions, according to United Methodist News Service.

    “It is a big tent church,” Lawrence said. “One of the concerns that some folks expressed is that we don’t have leadership in the church that reflects the diversity of the church. So this episcopal election doesn’t fix that, but it’s a step in the right direction.”

    Bishop Cedrick Bridgeforth, elected in the Western Jurisdiction meeting, agreed. He is the first openly gay African-American man to be elected bishop. The vote comes six years after the Western Jurisdiction elected the denomination’s first openly lesbian bishop, Karen Oliveto of the Mountain Sky Episcopal Area.

    The LGBTQ-affirming resolutions point “to the alignment of the denomination more with the mainstream of our country,” Bridgeforth said. “It can also help us begin to center our conversations where we have unity of purpose, rather than centering on divisions.”

    Bridgeforth will lead churches in the Greater Northwest Area, which includes churches in Alaska, Idaho, Oregon, Washington, and small parts of Montana and Canada. He said he has always worked across ideological lines in his administrative duties and would continue to do so.

    “I have used our differences as an opportunity for us to come together,” he said. “It creates more space for a different kind of conversation than, ‘That’s different, that’s bad, we can’t be together.’” If some churches under his jurisdiction do choose to leave the United Methodist Church, Bridgeforth said he would help them make that transition.

    “I would not want anybody to be where they don’t want to be,” he said.

    Progressive groups have said the church should be open to appointing bishops and other clergy, regardless of sexual orientation, who show they have the gifts for ministry and a commitment to serve the church.

    Conservatives, however, say the church needs to abide by its own rules.

    “I am sure Bishop Bridgeforth is a person of sacred worth, but he does not meet the qualifications to hold the office of elder, much less bishop, and should not have been elected,” Therrell said.

    At least 300 U.S. congregations have left the denomination this year, according to United Methodist News Service. Hundreds more are in the process of leaving, and Therrell predicted that number would be in the low thousands by the end of 2023. Overseas conferences in Bulgaria and Slovakia have ended their affiliation with the denomination, and churches in Africa are considering it, he said.

    Many are bound for the newly formed conservative denomination, the Global Methodist Church.

    The UMC is a worldwide denomination. American membership has declined to about 6.5 million, from a peak of 11 million in the 1960s. Overseas membership soared to match or exceed that of the U.S., fueled mostly by growth and mergers in Africa. Overseas delegates have historically allied with American conservatives to uphold the church’s stances on sexuality.

    Support for a compromise measure that would have amicably split the denomination, negotiated in 2020, fell apart after that year’s legislative General Conference was postponed three times due to the pandemic. The next General Conference is now scheduled to begin in April 2024 in Charlotte, North Carolina.

    A vote by a 2019 General Conference was the latest of several in recent decades that reinforced the church’s ban on gay clergy and marriage. But that vote also prompted many local conferences to elect more liberal and centrist delegates, whose influence was felt in this month’s regional votes.

    ———

    Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.

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  • Orthodox Church of Ukraine to allow Christmas on December 25 as rift with Moscow deepens | CNN

    Orthodox Church of Ukraine to allow Christmas on December 25 as rift with Moscow deepens | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    A branch of Ukraine’s Orthodox church has announced that it will allow its churches to celebrate Christmas on December 25, rather than January 7, as is traditional in Orthodox congregations.

    The announcement by the Kyiv-headquartered Orthodox Church of Ukraine widens the rift between the Russian Orthodox Church and other Orthodox believers that has deepened due to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

    The decision came after “taking into account the numerous requests and taking into account the discussion that has been going on for many years in the Church and in society; predicting, in particular due to the circumstances of the war, the escalation of calendar disputes in the public space,” the Orthodox Church of Ukraine said in a statement published October 18.

    Each church will have the option to celebrate on December 25, which marks the birth of Jesus according to the Gregorian calendar, rather than January 7, which marks the birth of Jesus according to the Julian calendar, still used by the Russian Orthodox Church.

    In recent years a large part of the Orthodox community in Ukraine has moved away from Moscow, a movement accelerated by the conflict Russia stoked in eastern Ukraine beginning in 2014.

    That schism became more open in 2018, after Patriarch Bartholomew I of Constantinople – a Greek cleric who is considered the spiritual leader of Orthodox believers worldwide – endorsed the establishment of an independent Orthodox Church of Ukraine and revoked a centuries-old agreement that granted the Patriarch in Moscow authority over churches in the country.

    The Moscow Patriarchate of the Russian Orthodox Church, which has become closely entwined with the Russian state under Russian President Vladimir Putin, responded by cutting ties with Bartholomew.

    Then in May the leaders of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC), another branch which had been formally subordinate to the Moscow Patriarchate of the Russian Orthodox Church, broke ties with the Moscow church, which is led by Patriarch Kirill, who has given his support to the invasion of Ukraine and has put his church firmly behind Putin.

    Ukrainian Orthodox Christians celebrate Christmas on January 7, 2016.

    In a statement, the UOC said it had opted for the “full independence and autonomy” of the Ukrainian church.

    The emergence of a church independent of Moscow has infuriated Putin, who has made restoration of the so-called “Russian world” a centerpiece of his foreign policy and has dismissed Ukrainian national identity as illegitimate.

    And Kirill remains outspoken in his support of the invasion, announcing in September that Russian soldiers who die in the war against Ukraine will be cleansed of all their sins.

    “He is sacrificing himself for others,” he said. “I am sure that such a sacrifice washes away all sins that a person has committed.”

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  • Pope calls female genital mutilation a crime that must stop

    Pope calls female genital mutilation a crime that must stop

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    ABOARD THE PAPAL PLANE — Pope Francis called female genital mutilation a “crime” on Sunday and said the fight for women’s rights, equality and opportunity must continue for the good of society.

    “How is it that today in the world we cannot stop the tragedy of infibulation of young girls?” he asked, referring to the ritual cutting of a girls’ external genitalia. “This is terrible that today there is a practice that humanity isn’t able to stop. It’s a crime. It’s a criminal act!”

    Francis was responding to a question about women’s right en route home from Bahrain. He was asked whether he supported the protests in Iran sparked by the death in custody of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini, who was detained by morality police after allegedly violating the country’s strict dress code for women.

    Francis didn’t directly respond, but gave a lengthy denunciation of how women in many cultures around the world are treated as second-class citizens or worse and said: “We have to continue to fight this because women are a gift.”

    “God … created two equals: man and woman,” the pope said.

    Francis has done more than any pope to give more decision-making roles to women in the church. He has appointed several women to key governing positions, including the No. 2 in the Vatican City State administration as well as several other high-ranking management roles. He has also named women — laywomen and religious sisters — as consultors to Vatican offices dominated by male clergy, including the one that chooses bishops.

    “I have seen in the Vatican, that whenever a woman enters to work, things improve,” he said.

    He said society would do well to follow suit, noting that his native Argentina remains a “macho” culture, but that such attitudes “kill” humanity.

    “A society that cancels women from public life is a society that grows poor,” he said.

    Francis was also asked about new cases of clergy sex abuse and cover-up that have emerged in the French church, with evidence that a bishop was allowed to quietly retire in 2021 despite having been found guilty by a church investigation of having spiritually abused two young men by making them strip during confession. More victims have reportedly come forward since the scandal was first reported.

    Francis didn’t reply when asked if such church sanctions should be made public going forward. But he insisted that the church was on the right path, even reviewing bad past canonical investigations and redoing them. He said the church was committed to not hiding abuse even if there are still some in the church “who still don’t see clearly, who don’t share” the need for justice.

    “It’s a process we’re doing with courage, and not all of us have courage,” he said. “Sometimes there’s the temptation of making compromises — we are enslaved by our sins.”

    But he said the goal was toward further clarity, noting that he had recently received two reports from victims lamenting their abuse and how their cases had been “covered up and then not adjudicated well by the church,”

    “I immediately said ‘Study this again, do a new judgment.’ So we’re now revising old judgments that weren’t well done,” he said. “We do what we can. We’re all sinners.”

    ———

    Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.

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  • Pope appeals for Lebanon leaders to put interests aside

    Pope appeals for Lebanon leaders to put interests aside

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    ABOARD THE PAPAL PLANE — Pope Francis appealed Sunday for Lebanon’s politicians to put their personal interests aside and agree on a path to help the country emerge from years of economic meltdown and a new political vacuum.

    “Lebanon now is suffering,” Francis said when asked en route home from Bahrain if he might visit the country, which he had been considering earlier this year but had to postpone.

    Francis didn’t respond directly but said he was greatly “pained” by the country’s descent into chaos and begged for prayers and for the international community to help Lebanon.

    “I take this opportunity to appeal to Lebanese politicians to put your personal interests aside and speak about the country and come to an agreement,” he said. “First God, then country, then personal interests.”

    Lebanese President Michel Aoun’s term ended at the end of October without a replacement, leaving Lebanon in a political vacuum that is likely to worsen its historic economic crisis.

    Many fear that an extended delay in choosing a successor could further delay attempts to finalize a deal with the International Monetary Fund that would provide Lebanon with $3 billion in assistance, widely seen as a key step to help the country climb out of a three-year financial crisis that has left three quarters of the population in poverty.

    ———

    Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.

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  • Christian monastery possibly pre-dating Islam found in UAE

    Christian monastery possibly pre-dating Islam found in UAE

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    SINIYAH ISLAND, United Arab Emirates (AP) — An ancient Christian monastery possibly dating as far back as the years before Islam spread across the Arabian Peninsula has been discovered on an island off the coast of the United Arab Emirates, officials announced Thursday.

    The monastery on Siniyah Island, part of the sand-dune sheikhdom of Umm al-Quwain, sheds new light on the history of early Christianity along the shores of the Persian Gulf. It marks the second such monastery found in the Emirates, dating back as many as 1,400 years — long before its desert expanses gave birth to a thriving oil industry that led to a unified nation home to the high-rise towers of Abu Dhabi and Dubai.

    The two monasteries became lost to history in the sands of time as scholars believe Christians slowly converted to Islam as that faith grew more prevalent in the region.

    Today, Christians remain a minority across the wider Middle East, though Pope Francis arrived in nearby Bahrain on Thursday to promote interfaith dialogue with Muslim leaders.

    For Timothy Power, an associate professor of archaeology at the United Arab Emirates University who helped investigate the newly discovered monastery, the UAE today is a “melting pot of nations.”

    “The fact that something similar was happening here a 1,000 years ago is really remarkable and this is a story that deserves to be told,” he said.

    The monastery sits on Siniyah Island, which shields the Khor al-Beida marshlands in Umm al-Quwain, an emirate some 50 kilometers (30 miles) northeast of Dubai along the coast of the Persian Gulf. The island, whose name means “flashing lights” likely due to the effect of the white-hot sun overhead, has a series of sandbars coming off of it like crooked fingers. On one, to the island’s northeast, archaeologists discovered the monastery.

    Carbon dating of samples found in the monastery’s foundation date between 534 and 656. Islam’s Prophet Muhammad was born around 570 and died in 632 after conquering Mecca in present-day Saudi Arabia.

    Viewed from above, the monastery on Siniyah Island’s floor plan suggests early Christian worshippers prayed within a single-aisle church at the monastery. Rooms within appear to hold a baptismal font, as well as an oven for baking bread or wafers for communion rites. A nave also likely held an altar and an installation for communion wine.

    Next to the monastery sits a second building with four rooms, likely around a courtyard — possibly the home of an abbot or even a bishop in the early church.

    On Thursday, the site saw a visit from Noura bint Mohammed al-Kaabi, the country’s culture and youth minister, as well as Sheikh Majid bin Saud Al Mualla, the chairman of the Umm al-Quwain’s Tourism and Archaeology Department and a son of the emirate’s ruler.

    The island remains part of the ruling family’s holdings, protecting the land for years to allow the historical sites to be found as much of the UAE has rapidly developed.

    The UAE’s Culture Ministry has sponsored the dig in part, which continues at the site. Just hundreds of meters (yards) away from the church, a collection of buildings that archaeologists believe belongs to a pre-Islamic village sit.

    Elsewhere on the island, piles of tossed-aside clams from pearl hunting make for massive, industrial-sized hills. Nearby also sits a village that the British blew up in 1820 before the region became part of what was known as the Trucial States, the precursor of the UAE. That village’s destructions brought about the creation of the modern-day settlement of Umm al-Quwain on the mainland.

    Historians say early churches and monasteries spread along the Persian Gulf to the coasts of present-day Oman and all the way to India. Archaeologist have found other similar churches and monasteries in Bahrain, Iraq, Iran, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia.

    In the early 1990s, archaeologists discovered the first Christian monastery in the UAE, on Sir Bani Yas Island, today a nature preserve and site of luxury hotels off the coast of Abu Dhabi, near the Saudi border. It similarly dates back to the same period as the new find in Umm al-Quwain.

    However, evidence of early life along the Khor al-Beida marshlands in Umm al-Quwain dates as far back as the Neolithic period — suggesting continuous human inhabitance in the area for at least 10,000 years, Power said.

    Today, the area near the marshland is more known for the low-cost liquor store at the emirate’s Barracuda Beach Resort. In recent months, authorities have demolished a hulking, Soviet-era cargo plane linked to a Russian gunrunner known as the “Merchant of Death” as it builds a bridge to Siniyah Island for a $675 million real estate development.

    Power said that development spurred the archaeological work that discovered the monastery. That site and others will be fenced off and protected, he said, though it remains unclear what other secrets of the past remain hidden just under a thin layer of sand on the island.

    “It’s a really fascinating discovery because in some ways it’s hidden history — it’s not something that’s widely known,” Power said.

    ___

    Follow Jon Gambrell on Twitter at www.twitter.com/jongambrellAP.

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  • Thousands pack Bahrain national stadium for pope’s main Mass

    Thousands pack Bahrain national stadium for pope’s main Mass

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    MANAMA, Bahrain — Thousands of Christians from around the Gulf packed Bahrain’s sports stadium on Saturday for Pope Francis’ big Mass, as he shifted the attention of his four-day visit to ministering to the Catholic community in the overwhelmingly Muslim region.

    Pilgrims wearing identical white caps to shade them from the morning sun waved the yellow and white flags of the Holy See as Francis looped around the Bahrain National Stadium in his popemobile before Mass. A big cheer erupted when he kissed a young girl in a bubble-gum pink dress who was brought to the vehicle.

    According to the Vatican, local organizers estimated some 30,000 people attended the service. Organizers had said that passes to the event were snapped up within two days of them becoming available, with pilgrims coming from Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries.

    “This is actually a very huge honor,” said Bijoy Joseph, an Indian living in Saudi Arabia who attended. “This is like a blessing for us to be part of our Holy Father’s papal Mass in Bahrain.”

    Francis is on the first-ever papal visit to the island kingdom the size of New York City that lies off the coast of Saudi Arabia. The primary aim was to participate in a government-sponsored interfaith conference to promote Catholic-Muslim dialogue. But for the final two days, he is focusing on ministering to the Catholic community, a minority in the country of around 1.5 million.

    Most are workers from South Asia, many of whom have left behind their families to work in Bahrain’s construction, oil extraction and domestic service industries.

    Sebastian Fernandez, an Indian living in Bahrain, said he was blessed to be able to attend. “It will be a fruitful Mass and we are happy to see our pope,” he said.

    After the Mass, Francis was meeting with young people at the Sacred Heart school, which dates from the 1940s and is affiliated with the church of the same name that was the first Catholic Church built in the Gulf. Francis wraps up his visit Sunday meeting with priests and nuns at the church.

    ———

    Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.

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  • Pope blasts ‘childlike’ wars at Bahrain interfaith summit

    Pope blasts ‘childlike’ wars at Bahrain interfaith summit

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    MANAMA, Bahrain — With Russia’s war in Ukraine raging, Pope Francis joined Muslim, Christian and Jewish leaders Friday in calling for the world’s great religions work together for peace, telling an interfaith summit that religion must never be used to justify violence and that faith leaders must counter the “childlike” whims of the powerful to make war.

    On his second day in the Gulf kingdom of Bahrain, Francis closed out a conference on East-West dialogue sponsored by King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa. It was his second such conference in as many months, following one in Kazakhstan, evidence of Francis’ core belief that moments of encounter among people of different faiths can help heal today’s conflicts and promote a more just and sustainable world.

    Sitting around him in the Sakhir royal palace grounds were leading Muslim imams, the spiritual leader of the world’s Orthodox Christians, and U.S. rabbis who have long engaged in interfaith dialogue, as well as the king. Speaker after speaker called for an end to Russia’s war in Ukraine and the start of peace negotiations. The Russian Orthodox Church, which sent an envoy to the conference, has strongly supported the Kremlin in its war and justified it on religious grounds.

    Francis told the gathering that, while the world seems to be heading apart like two opposing seas, the mere presence of religious leaders together was evidence that they “intend to set sail on the same waters, choosing the route of encounter rather than that of confrontation.”

    “It is a striking paradox that, while the majority of the world’s population is united in facing the same difficulties, suffering from grave food, ecological and pandemic crises, as well as an increasingly scandalous global injustice, a few potentates are caught up in a resolute struggle for partisan interests,” he said.

    “We appear to be witnessing a dramatic and childlike scenario: in the garden of humanity, instead of cultivating our surroundings, we are playing instead with fire, missiles and bombs, weapons that bring sorrow and death, covering our common home with ashes and hatred,” he said.

    King Hamad, for his part, urged a coherent effort to stop Russia’s war in Ukraine and promote peace negotiations, “for the good of all of humanity.”

    The visit is Francis’ second to a Gulf Arab country, following his 2019 landmark trip to Abu Dhabi, where he signed a document promoting Catholic-Muslim fraternity with a leading Sunni cleric, Sheikh Ahmed al-Tayeb. Al-Tayeb is the grand imam of Al-Azhar, the seat of Sunni learning in Cairo, and has become Francis’ key partner in promoting greater Christian-Muslim understanding.

    Al-Tayeb joined Francis in Bahrain and was on hand last month in Kazakhstan too. In his prepared remarks, called Friday for an end to Russia’s war “to spare the lives of innocents who have no hand in this violent tragedy.”

    Al-Tayeb also called for Sunni and Shiite Muslims to engage in a similar process of dialogue and try to heal their centuries of divisions, saying Al-Azhar was prepared to host such an encounter.

    “Let us together chase away any talk of hate, provocation and excommunication and set aside ancient and modern conflict in all its forms and with all its negative offshoots,” he said. Bahrain is ruled by a Sunni monarchy that has been accused by human rights groups of systematic discrimination against its Shiite majority, charges the government rejects.

    Later Friday, al-Tayeb was to meet privately with Francis and participate in a larger encounter at the mosque in the royal palace with the Muslim Council of Elders, which he heads.

    Francis was also bringing his message of dialogue to Bahrain’s Christian leaders by presiding over an ecumenical meeting and peace prayer at the Our Lady of Arabia Cathedral, the largest Catholic Church in the Gulf, which was inaugurated last year on land gifted to the church by Al Khalifa.

    Francis opened his visit to Bahrain on Thursday by urging Bahrain authorities renounce the death penalty and ensure basic human rights are guaranteed for all citizens — a nod to Bahraini Shiite dissidents who say they have been harassed and detained, subject to torture and “sham trials,” with some sentenced to death for their political activities. The government denies discriminating against Shiites.

    Francis also aimed to highlight Bahrain’ tradition of religious tolerance: Unlike neighboring Saudi Arabia, where Christians cannot openly practice their faith, Bahrain is home to several Christian communities as well as a small Jewish community.

    In his prepared remarks to the forum, U.S. Rabbi Marc Schneier, who has long worked to promote Jewish-Muslim understanding and serves as Al Khalifa’s special advisor on interfaith matters, praised Bahrain as a “role model in the Arab world for coexistence and tolerance of different faith communities.”

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    Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.

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  • Pope presses Muslim dialogue in first papal visit to Bahrain

    Pope presses Muslim dialogue in first papal visit to Bahrain

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    VATICAN CITY — Pope Francis is bringing his message of dialogue with the Muslim world to the kingdom of Bahrain, where the Sunni-led government is hosting an interfaith conference on East-West coexistence even as it stands accused of discriminating against the country’s Shiite majority.

    Human rights groups and relatives of Shiite activists on death row have urged Francis to use his visit, which begins Thursday, to call for an end to the death penalty and political repression in Bahrain. But it’s not clear if Francis will publicly embarrass his hosts during his four-day visit, the first of any pontiff to the island nation in the Persian Gulf.

    The 85-year-old pope, who has been using a wheelchair for several months because of strained knee ligaments, said Thursday he was in “a lot of pain” as he headed to Bahrain, and for the first time greeted journalists travelling with him while seated rather than walking through the aisle.

    Francis has long touted dialogue as an instrument of peace and believes a show of interfaith harmony is needed, especially now given Russia’s war in Ukraine and regional conflicts, such as in Yemen. On the eve of the trip, Francis asked for prayers so that the trip will promote “the cause of brotherhood and of peace, of which our times are in extreme and urgent need.”

    The visit is Francis’ second to a Gulf Arab country, following his 2019 landmark trip to Abu Dhabi, where he signed a document promoting Catholic-Muslim fraternity with a leading Sunni cleric, Sheikh Ahmed al-Tayeb. Al-Tayeb is the grand imam of Al-Azhar, the seat of Sunni learning in Cairo. Francis followed that with a 2021 visit to Iraq, where he was received by Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, one of the world’s pre-eminent Shiite clerics.

    Francis will meet again this week in Bahrain with al-Tayeb, as well as other prominent figures in the interfaith field who are expected to attend the conference, which is similar to one hosted last month by Kazakhstan that Francis and el-Tayeb also attended. Members of the regional Muslim Council of Elders, the spiritual leader of the world’s Orthodox Christians, Patriarch Bartholomew, a representative from the Russian Orthodox Church and rabbis from the United States are all expected, according to the Bahrain program.

    The trip will also allow Francis to minister to Bahrain’s Catholic community, which numbers around 80,000 in a country of around 1.5 million. Most are workers hailing from the Philippines and India, though trip organizers expect pilgrims from Saudi Arabia and other neighboring countries will attend Francis’ big Mass at the national stadium on Saturday.

    Bahrain is home to the Gulf’s first Catholic Church, the Sacred Heart parish, which opened in 1939, as well as its biggest one, Our Lady of Arabia Cathedral. The church, with a capacity of 2,300, opened last year in the desert town of Awali on land gifted to the church by King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa. In fact, the king presented Francis with a model of the church when he visited the Vatican in 2014 and extended the first invitation to visit.

    Francis will visit both churches during his visit and is likely to thank the king for the tolerance the government has long shown Christians living in the country, particularly when compared to neighboring Saudi Arabia, where Christians cannot openly practice their faith.

    “Religious liberty inside Bahrain is perhaps the best in the Arab world,” said Bishop Paul Hinder, the apostolic administrator for Bahrain and other Gulf Arab countries. “Even if everything isn’t ideal, there can be conversions (to Christianity), which aren’t at least officially punished like in other countries.”

    But in the runup to his visit to Bahrain, Shiite opposition groups and human rights organizations have urged Francis to raise human rights violations against the majority Shiites by the Sunni monarchy. They urged him to call for an end to the death penalty and request to visit the country’s Jau prison, where hundreds of Shiite activists have been jailed.

    Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International have repeatedly denounced the use of torture in prisons, as well as forced confessions and “sham trials” against dissidents.

    “We are writing to appeal to you as the families of twelve death row inmates who are facing imminent execution in Bahrain,” read a letter from the families to Francis released this week by the Bahrain Institute for Rights and Democracy. “Our family members remain behind bars and at risk of execution despite the clear injustice of their convictions.”

    Francis has changed church teaching to declare the death penalty inadmissible in all cases. He has regularly visited prisoners during his foreign trips, though no such prison visit is planned in Bahrain.

    The Vatican spokesman declined to say whether Francis would raise Bahrain’s human rights record publicly or privately during his visit.

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    Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.

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